


The Freeze

by silverr



Category: Original Work
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, F/F, Found Family, Lovers to Friends, No Nuclear Holocaust, No Pandemic, Past Relationship(s), Post-Apocalypse, Slice of Life, Snark, no zombies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-31
Updated: 2019-07-31
Packaged: 2020-06-24 08:14:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,408
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19719727
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silverr/pseuds/silverr
Summary: Of all the subdivisions full of ghosts, in all the deserted towns full of scavengeable materials, in all the world, she had to drive intomine?





	The Freeze

**Author's Note:**

  * For [engmaresh](https://archiveofourown.org/users/engmaresh/gifts).



> A thank you to **talkingtothesky** for beta.
> 
> If you're using text-to-speech, be aware that there is some NSFW language in this story.

.

.

It started like every other run she had done since the freeze. She'd put on her salvage outfit — loose cargo khakis with a dozen pockets and a lightly-armored tactical vest — and dropped a rough map off at the Tarlsbergs of where she'd be. Today's target was a wooded triangle bounded by the interstate, Route 32, and Barberry, a bland, well-off faux community where every house had a computer or tablet or smart screen in nearly every room, and everyone in the house had had a smartphone, which meant the houses were full of ghosts. It also meant an abundance of potentially useful items going to waste. As always, she would gather up the goodies, leave love messages for the ghosts, and color-code the area on the big map when she got home.

*

She had missed witnessing the actual event, as it had gone down while she was off-grid, but it had been easy to make some guesses about what happened once she saw the result. All over the city, anyone who had been looking at a smartphone, TV, desktop, laptop, or tablet had been frozen where they sat or stood, transformed into a translucent, incorporeal, pale blue sculpture. (It hadn't occurred to her until much later how horrifying it must have been for anyone on an airplane… or at least for anyone who hadn't been affected before the plane started going down.) No one knew if the people had been turned into holograms, or shifted half-way into some alternate dimension where time flowed differently, or spirited away by aliens or the Rapture with only a faint afterimage to mark where they'd been, so everyone just thought of them as ghosts. Rikki sometimes wondered if there was any way to figure out who did it, or how, or why, or how to reverse it, or whether it would ever wear off, though if there were answers to any of these questions she wasn't the woman to find them. Her contribution to the post freeze economy was to provide food, blankets, books, or shelter to anyone who needed them.

The development's gate was broken, stuck three-quarters of the way closed, but that was more than enough room for the trishaw. Rikki didn't see any signs of vandalism or break ins near the gate, so it was possible that no one else had been through here yet; still, it didn't hurt to be cautious. She parked out of sight next to the fifth house from the gate, then grabbed her bolt cutters and an empty rucksack. 

The first house had French doors leading from the patio to the kitchen. Rikki peered in: there were toys on the kitchen table, but no bowls or littler boxes or signs of pets, so she broke a pane next to the door handle and let herself in. 

The air was stale, but not rank: another good sign. There was a rust-colored dust puddle on the kitchen tile around the industrial size fridge. Rikki taped one of her standard messages across the stainless steel doors.

  1. _Don't open your refrigerator! The food inside spoiled months ago and you really don't want to know what it looks or smells like by now._
  2. _There are other survivors. Come join us in Littleton if you want! (Map on the other side.)_



She looked over the knives, taking only one, then searched through the drawers until she found a non-electric can opener, which she put in the walk-in pantry on the shelf next to the gourmet soups. Nobody knew if the ghosts would come back, or if they'd be human if they did, but at least she could help ensure that they wouldn't starve by reminding them that they had a way to open canned food. (Assuming that they didn't come back wanting to eat only brains.) After some consideration, Rikki took only a few packages of dried pasta and rice, some vacuum-packed fish, and an unopened box of tin foil. 

Her final task in the kitchen was to close the shutoff valve on the gas stove. It would probably take several trips to clean this subdivision out, and she'd prefer it not burn down before she was done.

Nothing of interest in the living or dining rooms. The powder room near the front door was under-decorated and towel-less, though there were five unopened boxes of sealed sterile gauze pads and packets of alcohol wipes in the cabinet under the sink. She took three of each, making a mental note to check the other bathrooms for injection pens.

She went back through the kitchen to see what was in the other half of the house. Down the hall was an expansive ground floor master suite, the type of setup where the bathroom is all marble and fancy fixtures and with an LCD screen near the toilet. It took her a moment to notice the back of the ghost's head crowning the edge of the tub. 

When she went over for a closer look she saw exactly what she expected to see: the water had long since evaporated, and the ghost's hand was on his dick. It was hilarious and awful to be memorialized that way, and yet also apt.

Linen closet was next. Nice stuff, obviously expensive. While she already had more blankets for both use and trade than she needed, the sheets were cream colored and high thread count; if nothing else they might make decent emergency bandages. (She'd made the mistake of going into the city hospital, in the first weeks after the freeze, and found that while the doctors and nurses had become ghosts, many of the patients had not. She had never been able to bring herself to go back.)

Bathroom cabinets had the usual assortment of over-the-counter meds and small band-aids. An unopened box of tampons. No prescription painkillers, which was disappointing and a little surprising. Shaving supplies. No beauty products other than the bottle of inexpensive shampoo near the tub. There was an unopened tube of antibiotic ointment (near expiration, but unopened counted for something) and opened boxes of gauze pads and disinfecting wipes. No injection pen, but it was probably entombed in the refrigerator.

Master bedroom. The bureau drawers were mostly men's clothes; the one drawer of women's pin-up lingerie was too small to be Bathtub Wanker's. The lingerie wasn't hidden, though, and so that combined with the lack of women's clothes or shoes in the closet, suggested a non-live-in playmate. Perhaps someone who came over on weekends that Wanker didn't have the kids?

She debated whether to check the upstairs. If the ground floor was any indication, Wanker probably had a well-stocked media room; she could use a few new titles for movie night, even if it meant catching sight of yet another Barbie froufrou pink and My Little Pony bedroom. 

Then again, at least Wanker was here. Seeing ghost kids in otherwise-empty houses always made her angry and depressed for days.

The bedroom was Star Wars themed, with an upscale bed made of really really nice oak, and happily, ghost-free. The smallest of the upstairs bedrooms had been set up as a TV and game room, and while more than half the discs were Disney, the rest looked as if Mr. Wanker had bought up the AFI 100. Rikki supposed she should give him credit for that, at least. She took _The Wizard of Oz, Sunrise,_ and _The Lord of the Rings_ — and, because so many had jokingly requested it, _Apocalypse Now._

On her way out she checked the garage, which had a surprising collection of antique woodworking tools. Spotless, too, so either they'd been only for show, or Wanker knew how to take care of them.

She felt mildly guilty as she took the tools down and rolled them into the cream-colored sheets, although though Wanker's first waking thought — if he ever woke up — wasn't likely to be of carpentry. Still, she left him a hammer and a chisel for self-defense.

The next three houses were virtual repeats of the first.

The fifth had an extremely well stocked bar, which was a problem. Rikki had already picked up quite a bit of food, and in general liquor was a lower priority for someone with finite pedaling power. Still, unopened bottles of rum and tequila and vodka had become rarer and rarer, and so she didn't feel she could pass them up. Plus, if needed she could always stop off on the way home and hide it in one of their caches. She used towels to wrap the bottles for transport, and grumbled as as she packed her last two rucksacks, "What I wouldn't give for a Jeep."

*

She was almost through the front gate before she heard the car. Though not visible, it sounded as though it was approaching her location, and fast. 

She backed up, hid the trishaw between two houses, then crouched behind a clump of bushes across the street, reviewing her Uncle Reynaldo's six rules of persuasion for dealing with unreasonable people. Maybe she'd be lucky. Maybe whoever it was was just passing through, or looking for something easy to smash and burn. There hadn't been serious trouble in the area for almost a year, and even then the standoff had taken place in town, where offers of shelter and supplies had disarmed them. (Also, the troublemakers had been outnumbered ten to one.) Most of the Littleton residents felt that that there weren't enough people around anymore for the baser types to get much of a following, and while Rikki didn't argue with this, she also felt that with so few people around, there were now many more places to dump a body that would never be discovered.

After a few minutes a dusty tan hybrid with what looked like a satellite dish welded to the roof came into view, barreling toward the gate at high speed. It stopped at the last moment, and though Rikki couldn't see through the dusty windshield too well, it seemed as though the driver, who was wearing a navy blue hoodie and sunglasses, was pounding the steering wheel. 

Only one in the car, though, which didn't strike Rikki as too threatening, and so, remaining out of sight, she called out, "Can I help you?"

The driver leaned out the car window. "I'm looking for Marguerite Vega," the woman shouted in Rikki's general direction. "Do you know where I can find her?"

That voice… Only one person besides her grandmother had ever called her _Marguerite_ in such an infuriating, nails-on-a-blackboard way. It was impossible, and yet… 

"Maybe," Rikki yelled back, staying down. "Get out of the car, and take off your hoodie and sunglasses. We want to see your face."

The woman that got out was wearing blue jeans, with what looked liked a strip of flowered bedsheet tied over her left knee. This was apparently bandaging an injury, as she took hopping steps away from the car. She unzipped and removed the hoodie — she was wearing a faded sleeveless chambray button down shirt underneath — and tossed it through the open car window, then snatched off her sunglasses and spread her arms in an impatient "Now what?" gesture. 

Her build wasn't quite right, and her hair was much too short and dark and dusted with grey at the temples, but her utterly pissy expression cinched it. This was definitely Elizabeth, Rikki's ex-wife.

"Liz? How the _fuck… "_ Rikki said as she stood up. Of all the subdivisions full of ghosts, in all the deserted towns full of scavengeable materials, in all the world, her ex had shown up _here?_

"Damn it, Marguerite! Cut the games!" 

"Six years, and all you can think of to do is to yell at me?"

Liz made a mocking half-bow. "Fine. Hi. How are you? Lovely weather we're having. How are your petunias this year? Can I borrow a free-range egg and a cup of flaxseeds?" She paused and took a breath as she put her sunglasses back on. "Was that enough chit chat? I fucking hope so. Are you going to tell the people hiding with you not to shoot me?"

"It's just me."

"Then get in the car!"

A reasonable person would have been offended by this rude behavior, but as someone who had been married to Liz for almost a decade, Rikki just said, "Give me a sec. I've got stuff here that I need to bring with me." 

"Is it important stuff?" Liz asked, hopping over to the car door. "Medical supplies?"

"Some of it."

Liz tossed the hoodie into the back seat and began to maneuver herself back into the car. "Well, hurry up then." 

"No need to get out, I can manage," Rikki said as she retrieved her trishaw and walked it through the gap in the gate. "Pop the hatch?" She offloaded her rucksacks into the back of the car, making room by moving aside a pile of blankets, a box of MREs and energy bars, two jugs of water, several opaque plastic storage bins with locking clips, and a disreputable covered plastic pail. Looked as though Liz was living the mobile life. 

As Rikki started taking off the trishaw's front wheel, Liz twisted in her seat to scowl back at her. "What are you doing?" she asked.

"So we can tow it. I need rope or a coat hanger."

"Leave it," Liz said. "Get it later."

"I'm really happy to see you too, Bossy McBosserson," Rikki grumbled as she dragged the trishaw behind the unkempt landscape bushes next to the gate. Well, at least with a wheel missing her ride was less likely to be stolen. Not that it was that likely anyhow, but it was the principle of the thing that rankled. 

"What was that?" 

"I said, 'If it's still here later.' " Rikki tossed the bicycle wheel into the back of the car, then yanked open the passenger door, threw herself into the seat, and slammed the door as hard as she could.

"Grow up," Liz said. 

"Whatever you say, _Betty."_ Rikki was very pleased by Liz's dirty look: apparently she still hated being called Betty. 

Liz's eyes were darting back and forth between the rear and side mirrors as if she expected the T-Rex from Jurassic Park to appear any minute. What the hell was going on? "How did you find me here?" Rikki asked.

"The Tarlsbergs said I should wait for you at some place called Whitehouse," Liz said. "Or is Whitehouse a person? But they also said I might be able to catch you in this area if I didn't want to wait."

"The Tarlsbergs? _My_ Tarlsbergs?"

"Of course _your_ Tarlsbergs. What other Tarlsbergs would I be talking about?" Liz was gripping the steering wheel so hard the leather wrapping squeaked, and was inhaling and exhaling in the deliberate, measured way that was her 'cool off before blowing up or throwing up' technique. "Where to now?"

Rikki wanted to know how Liz had come across the Tarlsbergs, but she could find that out later. "Back up to the road, then turn left. Follow that to SR-47, then take a right."

Liz glared through the windshield for a beat, then put the car in gear and made a three point turn. As she finished, she said, "I guess we can take your tricycle thing now, but be quick."

Rikki threw open the door. "Bungees? Rope? Coat hangers?"

Liz put the car in park, then released the hatchback again. "Coax cable and #14 gauge in the red box that's not a cooler."

"Gotcha." Rikki hurried to pull the trishaw out of the bushes. "Can I tie it to the roof?"

"No," Liz snapped. "I'm not risking damage to my dish."

"Geez, lighten up a little," Rikki found the red box and measured out several arm-widths of wire. "Fuckton of coax you got here. Lotta work just to get free cable."

Liz ignored this, but asked, "Since when do you dress in, what is that? Coffee stain camo?"

"Usually I don't." Rikki threaded the doubled length of wire through the car's bumper and around the trishaw's front frame. "I was out salvaging this morning."

"Do you have a gun? You looked like you were ready to shoot me."

"You're lucky I didn't. You came roaring up to the gate as if you were going to ram it," Rikki shot back. 

"I thought there might be people chasing me," Liz said. "I wanted to shake them."

That statement, delivered so matter-of-factly, gave Rikki goosebumps and an unpleasant twisting sensation in the pit of her stomach. "Explain please," she said as she finished tying off the wires. 

"I will. On the way to Whitehouse," Liz said.

Rikki had barely sat down and closed the door when Liz accelerated. 

"So left, then right?" Liz asked. "How far?"

"I'll let you know when we're getting close to the turnoff." She eyed the wide strip of floral bedsheet: the biggest pink spot wasn't from the roses. "What happened to your knee?" she asked. 

"I went into the bushes to pee, and tripped while I was pulling my pants up."

Rikki raised an eyebrow. "You need better bullshit than that to fool me, Betty. I've seen you play poker."

Liz sighed. "On the way here I saw men pulling a circus wagon that had women and children in it. I threw tear gas at them and fell running away."

"Well," Rikki said, "that sounds justified. So you helped the prisoners escape?"

"Actually," Liz said, squeezing the steering wheel again, "the cage wasn't locked. They weren't prisoners, it was just how they were traveling. They weren't happy that I had gassed their menfolk. "

Rikki started to laugh, and laughed even harder when Liz added, "One of the kids threw a rock at me." By that time Liz was laughing too.

After they finally stopped Rikki kept quiet, alternating glances at the rear view mirror with contemplation of the sliver of breast revealed obliquely by the unbuttoned top third of Liz's shirt.

"Are you seriously checking out my tits?" Liz asked suddenly.

"Of course," Rikki said. "Why shouldn't I? They're still great, we're old friends, I have fond memories."

Liz gave an exasperated snort, but there was also the flicker of a smile. 

*

It had been a cliché Meet Cute. Pride Day, Rikki and her crew had been on the Women in Trades float (aka the Construction Lesbians), awaiting the start of the parade, when an anglo with rainbow-streaked hair and a wrist full of bracelets made of recycled something or other had come over and asked if they could help figure out what was wrong with her float. "The motor is running but it won't move," she said. "And there's a burning smell."

Rikki generally didn't care for crunchy granola neopagan types, but something about this particular woman's green eyes had made her stomach do little flip-flops, so when Delores had said dryly, "Did you remember to release the parking brake on the unicorn drive?" Rikki had found herself saying, "Aw, don't be so mean." 

Delores had given Rikki a shove and said, "Go fix it, then." When Rikki had returned — after removing a wooden chock wedged in the wheel well of the float, an operation that had of course required much flexing of the arm and leg muscles presented by her shorts and tank top — all Delores had said was, "So, did Moonshadow Elvenhair give you her number?" 

"Her name is Elizabeth," Rikki had said, "and yes, she did."

The relationship had nearly stalled when Liz — who was working on a doctorate in environmental science — found out that Rikki was only nineteen and hadn't finished college. Rikki didn't see what the big deal was; she loved doing construction, made good money, and spent her weekends on Habitat projects and _pro bono_ repair jobs for the elderly and various shelters and not-for-profits. "I'm already making good money doing what I love," she'd argued. "Why should I go into debt to get a degree I'll never use?" Liz could hardly argue with that. Rikki followed this up by saying that if the seven-year age difference really bothered her, they could stick to day dates for a few years, and thus won her "older woman" over.

Two years after they met, Marguerite Vega and Elizabeth Meredith were married.

It started off great. They complemented each other in so many ways: where Rikki was practical, a realist whose family had naturally embodied Think Globally Act Locally by being active in their community, Liz was a visionary, passionate about empowering and comforting the whole world. Rikki admired Liz's gift for motivating people and leading crusades, and saw this as something Liz had inherited from her parents, old school hippie activists who had constantly moved from one country to another, risking their lives protesting oppression and injustice and greed. 

Unfortunately, just like her almost continuously-absent parents, Liz was also pretty shitty at one-on-one. Rikki hadn't noticed at first, since physical intimacy and the overall newness of being married had carried them along for a good while, but gradually she began to understand that Liz loved people, but her love wasn't for individuals but the abstract, for People with a capital P. Whenever Rikki tried to bring up this lack of emotional connection, challenged Liz to be honest about the problems they were having, Liz — who flat-out refused couples counseling — either let Rikki take all the blame, insinuated that she was too needy, accused her of not being dedicated to the cause, or found some other way of avoiding the topic. When Rikki, increasingly frustrated, started to drink, it gave Liz a convenient hook to hang their problems on. Finally, after nine years of marriage, after accusations and threats and ultimatums, there were divorce papers, and by then Rikki was so hurt and angry she'd signed them.

*

And now they were here. Six years later. Six years of absence, six years of silence, although it had taken two years for the drinking to stop and two more for the almost-calls and almost-emails and almost-dropping by for a visits to taper off. Rikki had never seen Liz at any of the events hosted by any of their mutual friends, and as far as Rikki knew, Liz had never asked any of those friends if Rikki's address or phone number had changed. 

It was too weird, running into Liz here, now, post-Freeze, years after she'd accepted that she'd never see her again. Was she hallucinating? Rikki shook her head. Yeah, or maybe it was a podperson! Or a shifter-monster like in _the Thing!_

"Which way?" Liz asked. They were approaching the intersection. "And how far after that?"

"Left, and not far. Five minutes or less, I guess? Hard to estimate. I haven't had a car for a while." 

A few minutes later, as they passed a boxy anonymous storage building huddled next to a gravel and asphalt parking area, Liz asked, "So when do we get to the town? You said five minutes."

Rikki almost laughed before she realized that, to Liz, _town_ meant city, and a city was a place you reached by exiting a highway, a place with 20-story apartment blocks and shopping centers and concert halls. The type of place where, if someone asked you where the library was, you'd ask in return if they were looking for a specific branch. In short, where Rikki lived was not a city, and therefore by Liz's perception was barely a town. "We're in it already," Rikki said. "There's not much to get to."

To be fair, the transition from country to town had been gradual. The country road had snaked through scrubby woods, slashed here and there with narrow dirt and gravel roads that looked as though they led deep into the woods and had plans to deal with trespassers. After a while, small lots cleared by the roadside began to appear, fairy rings of lawn surrounding small old houses guarded by hunkering barn-garages furred with peeling red and white paint. As the houses became newer and more frequent the road widened, acquired shoulders and occasional stepping-stones of sidewalk, and the proportion of trees to lawn changed until the trees were domesticated into decoration and accent.

They passed the park — which was a baseball field, a basketball court, and random benches — and then, across the street and a little farther on, the grade school and the high school.

"Cars in the lots," Liz remarked. "Are there enough people here to run the schools, or are those from… before?"

"From before," Rikki said. She never went into schools or day care centers unless she absolutely had to. Shopping malls, train stations, other places with lots of frozen adults — she was fine with those. She'd even peeked into a movie theater once, shining her flashlight over rows and rows of ghostly heads, but places that had been full of kids when the freeze happened? She couldn't deal. 

"And you live here," Liz asked, slowing down in obedience to the school zone sign, "all alone? Or do you live with the Tarlsbergs?"

"Oh, I'm not alone, not with so many people living here now," Rikki said. "There's always someone new trickling in. Some stay, some keep going. A lot of those who pass through come back later with others." 

A squat one story white building came into view ahead. "Pull in there," Rikki said.

"That's where you live?" Liz sounded dubious.

"Most of the time," Rikki said, holding back her grin until she'd got out of the car. If Liz had in fact been chased, she obviously wasn't too worried about it anymore, as she'd parked the car in full sight of the road.

Liz pointed to the small hand-painted CASA BLANK sign hung under the eaves. "Seriously?" she said, turning to Rikki with a comically incredulous face. _"This_ is Whitehouse?"

"It _is_ a white house." Rikki went to the back of the car to see if her trishaw had survived the tow. 

"So is that what you're doing now?" Liz asked. "Using an amoral persona to profit from protection of the innocent and courageous?"

Rikki's first impulse was to tell Liz to fuck off, but she was still curious about why her ex had tracked her down. Also, she had apparently been away from Liz's sledgehammer and snark approach to interpersonal interactions long enough that she was feeling almost nostalgic about it.

"Hardly, though I do serve up alcohol and entertainment as needed." Rikki saw Liz's face harden at the mention of liquor. "But that's as far as it goes. No Nazis, and sadly no Ingrid Bergman either." Rikki put the loose front wheel and other rucksacks in the trishaw, then dragged it around the side of the building to one of Casa Blank's entrances. 

When she came back Liz had got out of the car but was still staring up at the sign, frowning slightly. "Why didn't you just call it _Casa Blanca,_ then?" Liz asked. "That would have been more accurate and less confusing."

"Because Casa Blank is funnier," Rikki said. She rummaged in the rucksacks for a box of gauze and a handful of alcohol wipes, then put them in her vest pockets while she shouldered the rucksacks with the liquor. "Any of your stuff need to come inside? We've got limited refrigeration."

Liz shook her head. 

Offering her arm, Rikki said, "Now let's get inside so that I can take a look at that leg."

*

"You live here?" Liz asked for a second time, looking around in disbelief once they were through the door.

"Sure," Rikki said, setting her rucksacks down carefully on the overstuffed couch to the left of the door. Better to unpack the bottles later, when she didn't have to be subjected to tight-lipped disapproval. "Why not? it's bigger than the apartment I had in New York. I have room for a table and a couch and books to read. Toss in a bathroom and all the necessities are covered." Best not to mention the little cottage she used when entertaining company.

"But the walls," Liz said, gesturing. "What is this color? Cayenne powder? How do you stand it?"

"Paprika," Rikki said, putting the first aid supplies on table and pulling out a wooden chair. "The paint was here when I arrived. Now sit, and let me take care of your knee." She took off the tactical jacket and tossed it next to the rucksacks.

"Don't you cook?" Liz asked, lowering herself into the chair.

Rikki nodded at the two heavy wooden doors in the wall opposite the entrance. "Left hand door leads to what was a shared break room. It has a microwave, a fridge, and a stove." She took a basin, a sealed jar of saline solution, a pair of scissors, and a plastic bag with rolled bandages from a cabinet.

"You have electricity?"

"Sometimes. Solar panels on the roof. So how did you get hurt?" Rikki asked as she began unwrapping the strip of bedsheet Liz had used as a bandage. "How long ago?" A moderate amount of blood had soaked through the layers of the sheet, but it was dry. "How much does it hurt now?"

Liz wasn't making eye contact. "It's just a scrape. A couple of hours ago. It doesn't hurt if I don't bend my knee." 

Rikki carefully lifted the bandage far enough to see that, yes, the bottom layers of the sheet were sticking to the wound. She opened the seal on the Mason jar of saline and wet the bandage enough to lift it away. 

Liz chuckled. "You can your own sterile wash?"

"Why not? We also make dressing packets in the pressure cooker." The denim was bloody but not torn, so it probably wasn't that bad, but she was still going to take a look. "How much do you like these jeans?" Rikki asked.

"Cut them if you have to," Liz said, "I have another pair." She looked around the room again. "So was this a rehab project of yours?"

"Yes and no," Rikki said. The jeans were loose enough that she could rolling up the pant leg instead of cutting it. "Whoever owned the place had put the solar panels in, bought paint, and started replacing the windows, but that's as far as they got. There was still broken furniture and trash everywhere, and big holes in the walls and carpet."

"Why did you paint the room this horrible orange?"

"As I said, the paint was already here." She noticed that Liz's leg hair was as fine and soft and pale as ever, and remembered how much shit Liz used to get from the other activists because they thought she was catering to the patriarchy by shaving her legs. She glanced up at Liz, who was watching her. 

It almost felt like A Moment, but then Liz looked away and it passed.

Rikki finished rolling the leg of the blue jean above Liz's knee. The scrape was ugly, and the bruises and swelling would make it tender for a few days, but it didn't look serious. It certainly was consistent with a fall, but the circus wagon story was outrageous. Then again, Rikki had also noticed the plain gold band that Liz was wearing. The two of them hadn't worn wedding rings when they were married, as Liz had claimed that for her the sight of rings evoked the history of women being treated as chattels by patriarchal oppressors, but it seemed that Liz had changed her mind. Had she remarried? Is that why Liz was so jumpy? Was she fleeing a bad second or third marriage? The sort of spouse who would force Liz to wear a wedding ring might be the sort who would push her around.

This thought made Rikki unreasonably angry. 

"That's above and beyond," Liz said. "You had no obligation to use their paint."

Rikki reminded herself that she should get the facts before getting worked up over Liz's possibly-imaginary abusive new spouse. "Sure I did. When I saw the fierce hues they'd picked out, I had to respect their vision." She irrigated the abrasion with the rest of the saline just in case there were fibers, then applied a dab of antibiotic and a fresh gauze pad. 

There was the sound of muted laughter from the hallway leading to the kitchen, and then a knock. "You decent?" a familiar voice called out.

"Yeah, Jin, c'mon in," Rikki replied.

A very attractive young Korean man with a streak of magenta in his hair opened the door. "I heard you had incoming?"

Rikki nodded at the rucksacks on the couch. "Help yourself. I found a few things you'll like." 

He nodded and went through the rucksacks, making small approving noises until, with a final quiet "Ho, yes," he pulled out the bottle of Bacardi she'd taken from the last house. "Thank you, Miss Rita," he said, and then, noticing Liz's expression, tapped the bottle and added, "Medicinal," before taking the box of gauze. "Only one anti?"

"Yeah, " Rikki said. "You know I always check. So do A and B."

"Oh well," he said. "Maybe next time. You coming tonight?"

"Of course."

After he left Liz said, "So _that_ was your precious cargo? Booze for guys in pajamas?"

"Those weren't black pajamas, Liz, they were scrubs," Rikki said. "Jin's our itinerant RN. Handles stuff we can't, and sometimes picks things up for people who aren't able to come into town themselves."

"I see." Liz looked slightly less judgemental. "So Casa Blank is a clearinghouse for distributing stolen goods?"

Rikki finished bandaging the knee and then took the basin into the bathroom to empty it. "It definitely started that way."

"And then it turned into the Café Américain?"

Rikki put the basin back on the shelf and dried her hands on her jeans. "Some people were already hanging out here to see what came in from salvage runs. Gradually more were here to shoot the shit and play cards than to trade. Pretty soon the Blue Room —"

"Blue room? Painted one of the other fierce colors you had to respect, I suppose?" 

"Yep. Blue got a herd of tables and chairs, and then someone offered to hook up the generator so that I could play a movie once or twice a week. After that we started putting comfy chairs and books in Lime for people who were spooked by the ghosts in the library, or wanted to read someplace that wasn't so dead quiet."

"And I'll bet you also have a place where people crash, don't you?"

Rikki nodded. "Purple has beds. Sheets and pillows from ghostless houses; quilts and afghans from the local folks who like to make stuff that gets used."

"Everyone needs a warm dry place to sleep," Liz said, her voice suddenly hoarse, "and to feel that they're not alone." 

Rikki was startled. "Hey hey hey," she said, folding Liz into a hug. 

Liz hugged back fiercely and blubbered something that sounded like, "I've been driving around for so long."

Rikki drew back and tried to look her in the eye. "What, looking for me?"

She had meant it as a joke, but Liz looked at her with a raw mix of dread and challenge. "Fucking perimenopause," she mumbled. "The stupidest things set me off." She picked her old bandage off the floor, unfolded it to a clean section, and wiped her drippy nose. "I've spent the past year driving around. Broadcasting and trying to gather information."

"The dish on your car roof," Rikki said.

Liz gave a half-laugh. "Yup. After all, what's an apocalypse without shortwave radio operators?"

"Is that what you're doing? Do you string wires into the trees and all that?" Rikki asked as she put away the rest of the first aid supplies. "Is that how you know the Tarlsbergs?"

Liz nodded as she rolled her pant leg back down, but didn't provide any details.

Rikki could tell that, unless someone started asking the big questions, such as _How Did You Manage to Survive the Freeze?_ and _So Why Exactly Are You Here?_ and _Who Are You Seeing These Days?_ the conversation was going to lose momentum and come to a full, awkward, silent stop . Well, when in doubt, channel her mother. "Are you hungry?" 

"A little," Liz said.

"There will be a cookout in a few hours," Rikki said, "but I've got something that should tide you over until then." She went into the kitchen and returned with several apples. "Want to go sit outside?"

"Sure."

Behind the Casa Blank, screened from the street, was a large back yard. The half closest to the building was a vegetable garden; beyond it, a redwood children's playset, two swings and a yellow plastic slide, nestled under a line of trees.

"Behold," Rikki said. "Lettuce, broccoli, cabbage, squash, zucchini, runner beans, tomatoes, spinach, cucumbers, turnips, radishes, pumpkins…"

Liz gasped. "Are those carrot tops?"

"Yeah. Want a few carrots?"

"Yes, please," Liz said. "It's been ages since I had fresh vegetables."

Rikki set the apples down on top of a covered rain barrel. "You must be so sick of MREs and energy bars." 

"You can't begin to imagine," Liz said. "Not only am I eating expired stock in unpopular flavors, I've gotten used to the taste."

"Scary." Rikki eased a few carrots out of the soil, rinsed them off with a quick spray from the hose, and then handed them to Liz. "Enjoy."

They walked around the edge of the garden to the playset. 

'I love this time of year," Rikki said, brushing leaves from the slide and setting down all but one of the apples. "Summer's fading, winter's a while away." She sat down on a swing. "The sky's best blue."

Liz nodded. "Equinox light has a special quality." She sat down on the other swing. 

They sat there for a while, munching their apples and carrots, enjoying the sunlight and the pattering sound of the wind-swept leaves.

"So," Rikki said, lobbing her apple core across the yard and into the compost bin, "Where were you when it happened?"

"The freeze?" Liz asked. She was doing that weird thing she always did with a raw carrot, holding it sideways like a flute and gnawing off the outer layer before eating the core. "I was in Antarctica. Measuring glaciers." Crunch, crunch, crunch. "With West African and German climatologists." 

Rikki wasn't sure she'd heard that right. "Antarctica? How did you get from there to here? Didn't you have computers?"

Liz shrugged. "We were on a ship. One of the scientists froze right in plain sight, and when we saw a second one freeze when they ran forward to help and glanced at the computer, we ran around warning everyone to close their eyes and shut off their screens."

"No one was using a smartphone?" Rikki asked. The cities were full of ghosts holding dead phones.

"That close to the South Pole, the satellites —" She paused and twirled her finger. "Eh, short answer? We were going into a long no-bar period." She finished off the orange part of the carrot. 

"So it was like _War of the Worlds,"_ Rikki said, "where all the people who watched the meteor shower were replaced with doppelgangers."

As expected, Liz didn't pick up on Rikki's mischievous tone, but immediately shook her head and said, "No, _War of the Worlds_ is Martians with death rays. Doppelgangers is _Invasion of the Body Snatchers._ Meteor shower is _Day of the Triffids_. Don't you remember? Anyone who saw the green light went blind and got eaten by carnivorous walking plants — oh, fuck you! You're playing me!"

Rikki waggled her eyebrows. "You make it too easy." When Liz made a face, Rikki prompted, "Anyhow, you were saying? You shut off the screens?" 

After a moment, Liz continued. "So, we decided by the time we got back to Lagos that gathering data and coordinating recovery efforts should be our top priorities. "We managed to scrape together enough resources to send out two flights, one to Europe, and one to North America. The plan was to travel around encouraging shortwave operators worldwide to use 19 MHz to send reports to our centralized data hub, because even if they can't communicate directly with the West African ALLISS, sooner or later their content will be passed along by someone who can. As more and more people have checked in, the channel's also becoming the place for general inquiries. Warning of problems, helping people reconnect."

Rikki smiled a little at Liz's use of the imperial We. "So you're essentially setting up a planetary game of telephone?" she said.

"I guess," Liz said slowly. She was now munching the carrot's stem and leaves in little bites, like a guinea pig. 

Rikki was both amused and annoyed at the wash of affection this ridiculous sight caused. How was it that she was still so fond of this infuriating person? Well, she might as well lean into her folly, own it."I think it's kinda badass," she said quietly. "Traveling all over, getting people to talk to each other, getting them all on the same megahertz." She poked Liz's unbandaged leg. "It's the kinda thing I always admired about you."

Liz looked away and lifted one shoulder in the half-shrug Rikki knew so well. "The real credit goes to the individual operators who are gathering and passing along information, especially about hostile communities or other toxic areas…"

"Toxic areas?" Rikki said. "Oh shit, I didn't think about that! Unattended nuclear power plants all over the world, full of ghost technicians. Not good."

"Fortunately most seem to have had either a completely automated shut down failsafe, or enough unaffected personnel to keep things under control. We've heard from a few installations in a number of countries, but there are still big areas of quiet."

"What happens if they just keep sitting there?" Rikki asked. "Won't they blow up sooner or later?"

"I don't know," Liz said. "Other people are working on that." She sounded tired. 

An extra-brisk gust came along and shook the branches, launching a swirl of leaves.

"Super Vega!" The twins had seen her as they pedaled past the Casa. Arthur and Bill weren't actually twins, but looked so alike that they might as well have been. 

Rikki waved. "Where you delinquents headed?" she asked, though she was pretty sure they were off on a salvage run.

"East Green," Bill said. "Going to bring back the rest of the goodies we boxed up the other day. We left details with Jossi."

Rikki glanced up at the sky, where fast moving clouds had started to intrude on the perfect blue. "You're gonna get wet."

"Hush, woman," Arthur said. "I predict a rain-free party."

"Need us to pick up anything?" Bill asked.

"Jin needs topical antibiotic." 

"He always needs that," Arthur said. "He must be eating the stuff. Peanut butter and antibiotic sandwiches."

"I meant for you," Bill said, "or your friend."

There had, of course, been a wiggle of innuendo in Bill's voice. "I know what you meant," Rikki replied, grinning, "and I don't know yet." 

"What was that all about?" Liz asked as the twins waved and pedaled off

"They wanted to know if you were staying, and if so whether they needed to get you your own bed, or if you would be sleeping in mine."

Liz eyed her warily. "Which part of that don't you know?"

"Whether you're staying or not."

"Because I don't think we should —"

"I know," Rikki said. "I agree."

Rikki thought Liz looked mildly surprised, and perhaps… a bit disappointed? Or was that wishful thinking?

"So," Liz said, "I thought you did the salvage."

"Oh, I do. A lot of us do. But Artie and Bill have a genius for it. It's like a superpower. They can smell the stuff we need."

"Are there frozen in the places you steal from?" Liz asked. 

There had been a hint of reprimand in the question, and Rikki was reminded of the nuns in her primary school. "Look, Sister Mary Betty, we only take from people who have a surplus, and we never take it all." Well, almost never, but that didn't need to be mentioned. "And we always leave enough of the necessities in case they ever wake up. Canned food, a non-electric can opener, blankets, clothes. All that stuff."

Liz made a soft "whatever" noise.

Rikki was tempted to ask if Liz had purchased her car in Antarctica or West Africa and then flown it or driven it across the ocean, but she held back. In the old days, in the last few years of their marriage, she would have jumped at the rare chance to puncture Liz's moral superiority, but the years had softened her enjoyment of the well-timed jab. Petty shit like that wasn't that important anymore.

It seemed the years had mellowed Liz a little as well, for she asked, in the tone that Rikki recognized as a Liz's version of 'teasing-with-olive branch,' "What about you? How did you miss going blue? Forget to plug in your phone?" 

Rikki shook her head. "Something like that." She scuffed the dirt under the swing. "So has anyone figured out what happened? Like, was it robots?"

Liz raised her eyebrows. "Robots?"

"Yeah," Rikki said. "Like, I dunno, Skynet."

A double take was added to the raised eyebrows, "Skynet like… The Terminator?" She laughed. 

"Oh fuck you. It's not that stupid an idea. Networked electronics were involved. AI is a thing. So are self-aware neural nets."

"Except that the electronics only affected people for a day," Liz said, "and whole sections of the world were barely affected. And even if it was Skynet," Liz held up a finger to stop Rikki from talking, "one consequence of the freeze is that there are a lot of places with no electricity. Or do you think that our new robot overlords are solar-powered?"

"Okay, I see your point." She didn't ask if it was possible that some of the power plants in those big areas of quiet were under AI control.

"Also," Liz said, getting up to take an apple from the slide, "robots, or any other terrestrial cause doesn't explain the missing clades."

"Huh?"

 _"Testudines_ are missing," Liz said as she sat back down. 

"English?"

"Turtles."

"What do you mean, turtles are missing?" 

"Missing like, missing," Liz said softly. She was turning the apple over and over in her hands. "Disappeared. Gone without a trace. From zoos, from pet stores, from houses, from beaches."

"I can't believe —"

"And that's not all. _Canis_ is gone as well. Have you seen any dogs since the freeze?" Liz asked. "Anywhere? in any of the houses or apartments?" She looked down and added softly, "Alive. I mean."

Rikki was thunderstruck. "No, I… wow. Other pets, yeah, but," she shook her head, "I figured that they were outside somewhere. Doing their own scavenging."

"Maybe they are," Liz said, "but so far no one's reported seeing any. We can rule out a species-specific pandemic, because that would have left — " She obviously didn't want to say it. "And there aren't any, not even in urban areas with thousands of dogs."

"Yeah." Rikki didn't want to say it either. _Maybe they're all spooked and in hiding,_ she thought, but she knew it wasn't true. Not if it was all dogs, everywhere. "Yeah, it doesn't make any sense for robots to do anything like that." Unless they were all buried at sea, but even then it made no sense. "So what did?"

"There are a few conjectures," Liz said, "but nothing anyone can prove."

"Aliens," Rikki said, rubbing her face. "Occam's Razor says aliens."

Liz looked at her. "It does not."

"When you've eliminated the impossible —" Rikki began.

"That's not Occam's Razor," Liz said. "That's Sherlock Holmes." She looked down at the apple as if surprised she had it. "We're not ruling out aliens, though. It might explain the variety of clades taken, as if for study."

"It's more than just turtles and dogs?" Rikki asked, her throat tightening, because what the fuck.

"Lemurs," Liz said. "Sharks. Certain orders of red algae. Certain families of fish. Several dozen clades of plants. A few prokaryotes… "

"Why those?"

Liz shook her head. "We have no idea. If there was some governing criteria behind the selections, the thieves certainly know a hell of a lot more about taxonomy than we do."

"Any bugs? Because they're clearly not intelligent if they took mosquitoes and buffalo gnats." 

"You've watched _Lilo and Stitch_ too many times," Liz said. 

It made Rikki momentarily happy that Liz remembered. "Maybe they're still out there," she said. "Maybe they just borrowed them, and they'll bring them back."

"I hope so. Along with New Zealand."

At this point Rikki was out of incredulity. "Okay, now you're playing me."

"Nope."

"The whole… did it blow up?"

"No explosion. It just disappeared."

"How do you know?"

"I haven't heard the tapes, but apparently a bush plane saw it go and radioed a warning that a tsunami was headed for Tasmania and the southeast coasts. Granted, even without the chaos of the freeze, a hysterical transmission saying that New Zealand was gone and that the ocean was a bowl wasn't going to get bumped to the right channels in time to warn people."

"Shit."

"After the water receded the geologists thought it must have been an undetected quake, but then a NOAA research vessel reported that the subantarctic front and the Antarctic Circumpolar Current —" She stopped at Rikki's blank look. "Trust me, if they say it's gone, it's gone."

"This is just," Rikki rubbed her forehead. "I mean, the freeze was bad enough, but all this scares me all over again. What if they're still out there? What if they take more?"

"I don't know." She watched the parking lot, where people were starting to gather in the late afternoon light, carrying in _chimeneas_ and portable fire pits and setting up long tables next to Casa Blank. "Are you going to tell them? Your people, here?"

"I don't know." Rikki hugged herself. "I probably should. I mean, they have a right to know, but what good will knowing do anyhow? It's not as if we can prepare for it, especially if next time they get at us through sunlight or water. I don't want to lay this information on them when there's nothing they can do about it." She felt her chest closing up with terror. "Fuck. _Fuck._ Now I really understand that 'ignorance is bliss' thing."

Liz put her hand on Rikki's shoulder and gave a comforting squeeze. "Breathe," she said. 

They sat. Liz took a tentative bite of her apple. 

"I didn't forget to plug in my phone," Rikki said at last. "I was doing a job for my brother-in-law."

"Oh? Who got married?" Liz asked. "Rosa or Alicia?"

"Alicia. Anyhow, it was an old hunting cabin that belonged to his grandfather. He wanted to build it out a little, a bedroom or two, add insulation, solar electric, indoor composting toilets. Make it a little less rustic so that they could use it as a vacation home. The contractor he hired took off and left it half done, so Ed called me up and asked if I minding coming out there to finish it." She sighed. "It was so peaceful. No one else for acres."

"Just you and your power tools," Liz said, but she was smiling. "You must have been blissful."

"I was," Rikki said. "When I was done I tried to call them to let them know I was on my way back, but I got some weird message. I figured the reception was iffy because of the hills, so I packed up the truck and headed back to their house. I knew something was weird because there was hardly any traffic, but then…" Tears began to well up: she hadn't talked about this with anyone else. "And then I went in and they were all there, Alicia was on the couch, showing the baby something on her tablet, and Ed was leaning over them. It was like, someone's sick idea of a Nativity sculpture." She took a shuddering breath, and let the tears splash down onto her hands.

Liz was there in an instant, kneeling by the swing and hugging her, rubbing her back.

"And then," Rikki said, because she couldn't leave the story there, in that family room with the ghosts of people she loved, "I charged my phone and started calling, like, everyone. When no one picked up, I turned on the TV, but there was nothing. I went around to the neighbors, and some were frozen, and the rest were gone." She put her hand over Liz's, and rested her chin on the top of Liz's head. "And then, I got in the truck and drove, and when I finally got tired of driving I was here. I didn't see any point in going anywhere else, so I stayed."

In the parking lot next to Casa Blank, Fara and Yusef were feeding kindling into the cookfires while a romp of kids were playing tag around the tables. Arthur and Bill had returned early from their East Green jaunt, and a half-dozen people were helping them unload loot from the carts behind their bicycles. 

"Is the guy in the white suit the same person you introduced me to earlier?" Liz asked. "Jin, of the black scrubs?"

"Yeah," Rikki said. "That's his party outfit. Known locally as the Elvis jumpsuit."

"Why? It's not a jumpsuit, and isn't very Elvis-y."

"Well, you can't see it from here, but those pants have little gold stars on them. And he's wearing silver cowboy boots."

Liz snorted. "I see why you made this your home." 

Rikki touched Liz's wedding band. "You're welcome to stay as long as you want, or to come back any time, but you have your radio work." She couldn't resist adding, "And I see you're chattel."

"Ha! No, the ring's a prop," Liz said. "I figured I was less likely to get hit on if people thought I was mourning someone I lost in the freeze." 

Implying that she hadn't been involved with anyone at the time or the freeze, or since? "And before that? Have you been serious about anyone since you became a free woman?"

"I've always been free," Liz said mildly, "but I don't see that what I've done since we divorced is any of your business. Does nine years of marriage give you a right to pry?"

Rikki was as stunned as if she'd been slapped, but before she could say anything Liz exhaled noisily and looked up at the sky. "Sorry, that was out of line. Why has fighting with you always been so much easier than getting along? Are we really that incompatible?"

Rikki hesitated, but with all their history, as Liz's friend, she owed her honesty. Even if it was going to hurt. "In some ways," she said, "yeah, but I think it's more that you're always looking for something to push against. You tend to see everything as a problem to be solved. Which is really great for social issues, but for other things, for things that aren't broken…"

"I break them," Liz said, nodding. "Yeah. My parents were like that, too. I remember telling them once that they didn't have conversations, they waved placards and slogans. I guess I do the same thing." She looked at Rikki. "I remember you telling me once that you felt like a campaign volunteer instead of a life partner."

Rikki winced. "That was… harsh. I was probably — "

"Drunk? Yeah, you were. But it was true." Liz was still holding her half-eaten apple, and now she stared down at the bite she'd taken as if willing the missing piece to grow back. "It was so true that I spent the next couple of years trying to bury it, and trying to make you hate me, so that _you'd_ be the one to leave _me._ And then I'd be off the hook, because it would be your fault."

"Didn't work."

"I know. I don't understand why." 

"Because I loved you anyway," Rikki said, "and also because I knew what you were trying to do, and I wasn't going to let you make me into the villain."

"You're so fucking stubborn."

"I really am," Rikki said gleefully.

"Anyhow, what about you?" Liz asked. "Anything serious?"

"Nope, nothing much," Rikki said, starting to swing. "How does the song go? 'Nothing compares to you' ?"

Liz looked over at Rikki. "Oh, stuff it, Sinead. You seriously expect me to believe that you haven't slept with anyone since we got divorced?"

"I didn't say _that,"_ Rikki said, leaning back so that she'd go as high as she could. "A girl's gotta eat. As you well remember."

"Still so vulgar." Liz finished off her apple, then got off her swing and walked over to toss the core into the compost. "We should go help set up," she said.

"They've got it covered." Rikki was getting into the rhythm. Legs out, lean back; legs under, sit up. "Moonshadow Elvenhair."

"Huh?"

Rikki dragged her feet into the dirt to stop swinging. "I never thought you'd cut your hair so short."

Liz shrugged. "It's easier to take care of," she said, "and I felt guilty about putting so much shampoo and dye into the water system." Then, her eyes flicking up and down as if unsure how Rikki would react, she said, "You let yours grow. It looks good."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," Liz said, very softly. "Damn good."

It seemed to Rikki as though they were heading toward another Moment, but just then she noticed the Tarlsbergs making their way purposefully into the back yard.

"Who are those people?" Liz asked.

"The Tarlsbergs."

"They look like something out of a fairy tale illustration."

It was true. Jossi was tall and thin, Tooks was short and round. Both had little square spectacles and white hair pulled back into a long braids, and both were wearing lumberjack check shirts and denim overalls.

"You never did explain how you hooked up with them?" 

"Almost every shortwave operator gives me information about other operators they're talking to," Liz said, "and what frequency they're usually on. I was referred to the Tarlsbergs' wavelength a few weeks ago."

"Beans are looking good, Rikki," Tooks called out as they passed the garden. 

"I'm still expecting to sample those cabbage rolls of yours again this year," Rikki called back. "I grew marjoram in the greenhouse just for you."

Tooks chuckled. "Ya, ya, we'll make them."

"Greenhouse?" Liz asked. "Are you growing plantains?"

"I wish." Suddenly she wished she could taste her mother's _pastelón_ just once more, or her uncle's _piononos._

Liz said, as if in compensation, "You should be able to grow ingredients for _sofrito,_ at least."

"I do." As Tooks and Jossi came closer Rikki said, "This is Elizabeth."

"We thought so," Jossi said, shaking Liz's hand and saying, "So you found the lady of the white house after all."

"Yes, thank you." A flush was spreading along the side of Liz's neck. "Your directions were very helpful."

Tooks put a hand on Rikki's shoulder and said with great seriousness to Liz, "This woman is good people. It was a worthy quest."

"Yes, I know," Liz said. The flush had reached her ear. "Thank you."

"Quest?" Rikki asked, but Liz ignored her.

"Will you be joining us?" Jossi asked Liz.

Liz gulped, and Rikki, trying not to laugh, said, "They mean for the cookout, Betty. They’re not trying to get you into a cult."

Liz gave her a look, and then said, "Of course!" sweetly to Jossi.

The two Tarlsbergs beamed at them and nodded, and then, hand in hand, wandered back to the parking lot.

"Quest?" Rikki asked again. "So you've been driving all over the world looking for me?"

"Oh, get over yourself," Liz said. "Whenever I find a new operator, after my questions about animals and power and their experiences of the freeze I give them a list of names of people who are trying to connect with their friends and loved ones —"

"So which am I?" Rikki asked. "Friend or loved one?"

"Why does it matter? Isn't it enough that you were on the list?"

"But you seemed so mad when you found me."

"I was… stressed, okay? I wasn't expecting it to actually be you." She made a face and looked off into the trees. "A couple of weeks ago I drove all the way out to the coast, way off my planned route, because someone said they knew a woman with the last name of Vega and a first name of M-something lived out there."

"It wasn't me."

"Well of _course_ it wasn’t you. It was a woman named Michelle Vargas," Liz said. "I was so _pissed._ It was a week of data gathering and fuel, lost, boom, just like that. At least I found a string of untapped gas stations on the way back. Anyhow, then someone who said they were broadcasting from, I don't remember, Wales or Arizona or something, said they had passed my survey questions and list along to some people called the Tarlsbergs, and that the Tarlsbergs had claimed to know a Rita Vega. I almost didn't bother to follow up, because I expected to be —" She made a choked half-sob sound and wiped a tear off her cheek. "Ugh. Fucking _hormones."_

"You expected to be what? Disappointed again?"

Liz made a face. "You are just loving this, aren't you?" 

"I just want you to admit that you were looking for me because you missed me."

Liz shrugged. "Fine. Whatever. Yes, I was looking for you because I missed you. I've missed you since the day after we signed the fucking paperwork. Happy now?"

"You're such a mess," Rikki said, putting her arm around Liz's shoulder. "I guess that's why I love you."

Liz nodded and swiped at her face again. "Damn right," she said, then leaned against Rikki and whispered, "So which one is Jossi and which one is Tooks?" 

"Maybe you should hang around," Rikki said, "long enough to figure it out."

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_~ The End ~_

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If you liked it, let me know! I love hearing from readers.

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_© 2019. Posted 31 July 2019; rev 30 Oct 2019_


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